


It Fits Me

by kaixo (ballpoint)



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Gen, Real Madrid CF
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-23
Updated: 2017-09-23
Packaged: 2019-01-04 14:40:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12170907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ballpoint/pseuds/kaixo
Summary: In football, if you’re unhappy, you’re never lucky, Marcelo says. After the transfer to Manchester United falls through, Navas realises how true it is.





	It Fits Me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ascience](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ascience/gifts).



**September 01. 2015**

He kept missing the shots.

Keylor knew the routine of this team. The goalkeeping coaches were the same, the drills the same. But…

He kept missing the shots.

His surroundings hadn’t changed. The sky above them an unending and even blue, the sun unerringly bright. 

La Cuidad Real Madrid, the place he now knew well as he did the back of his hand. Every day he drove out here to practice, the routine usually welcoming and settled. The landscaped pitches underfoot as flat and even as a still, green carpet. 

Off to the side, Benitez stood, hands in pockets, his head and piercing eyes following the progress of play. Benitez’s coaching staff set out to the outfield players who practised in the distance. The sun shining on their heads as they went through the motions, skin dewy with sweat, and limbs gleaming in the light. 

Today, Zidane took a break from coaching Real Madrid Castilla and stopped by to watch the proceedings. He stood off to one side; his features impassive as he observed the training manoeuvres set out in front of him. Arms folded across his chest, loose-hipped, the corners of his mouth twitching in amusement at whatever Benitez said in his direction. 

“Focus!” Valero hissed at Keylor, as another ball zoomed past his face, into the back of the net. 

“Perdón,” Keylor held up a gloved hand. 

“¿Qué?”

“I need a minute, please,” Keylor gestured to the sun above. “It’s hot.”

“Okay,” Valero checked his watch discreetly before glancing up at the sky. Although the month said September, two days after the transfer window had closed, it still felt like the edges of a Spanish summer; hot and bright. 

“Take ten minutes, okay? But we must suffer later.”

Keylor nodded his thanks at Davide, a slender boy with a shy smile appeared seemingly from thin air, now attending to his gloves. 

“Gracias.”

“De nada, when you need help, call me, yes?”

“Sí,” Keylor murmured, as he allowed himself to just... fall to the ground with a thud, his hands and feet flung outward as he lay on the pitch in the shape and animation of an inert starfish. 

He closed his eyes against the brightness, feeling the sun's heat warming his kit and his skin. 

Not his bones. 

His bones still felt cold.

***

“Paras.”

He felt the cool shadow thrown across his face, the solid figure blocking the sun from his eyes. Keylor slitted one eye open, seeing the halo of frizzy curls as it trapped the sun's light and softened its glare. The face of the hair connected to; skin ochre brown, eyes big and dark with mischief, his smile as bright as the sun he’d shielded Keylor from. 

“Marcelo.”

“Pargazo,” Marcelo teased, as he dropped to his haunches, elbows resting on his thighs. “Already sleeping on the job, eh? The season has only just begun.”

“I already feel as if I have lived through a lifetime.”

Marcelo’s mouth briefly moved into a pout, before he nodded his understanding. “Amigo, I am glad you are here.”

“So am I.”

***

Balaídos, the home of Celta Viga, may have been smaller than the Bernabeu but the atmosphere just as electric and vicious. Under the floodlights, Keylor prowled along the mouth of the goal.

Real Madrid started well, yes, Cristiano scoring after the first eight minutes, his shirt off and his torso sheened under the floodlights for a moment - a lifetime - as he collected the congratulations festooned on him by his teammates. 

Twenty-two minutes, in Danilo got the second goal. Real Madrid’s forwards imperious and surgical. 

Keylor wasn’t fooled. 

As a goalie he had to be equal parts soldier, part shaman. 

He had to be able to see the shape of the game in play, using the patterns of purpose to predict where the next source of danger came from. Concentration on the task now paramount; his mind retreating to a wall of silence beyond the din, perception slowing down the time before him. The Celta Vigo supporters urging their players on, with shouts, chants and war cries. Buoyed by their supporters, the players advanced towards goal in their pale blue shirts, their movements ceaseless and purposeful like waves. 

Their forwards splitting off into a hydra-headed attack; the ball spinning, looping and bouncing from boot to boot. 

The threat of goals sharpened the danger in the air, made audible by the home side’s jeers, contrasting with the gasps and screams from the away fans gave their warnings, their shouts loud as cannon. 

Instinct overruled thought. 

A shift on the balls of his feet, and Keylor moved. 

Taking to the air in the left corner, gloves wrapped around the ball rocketing from Orellana’s boot. 

Pass forward, ball taken off Benzema, the blue shirts regrouping, ready for more.

No thought, just action: a lunge, glove blocking Jonny’s shot. 

Wass, Hernández and Aspas, separating into three entities, squaring up for more efforts. 

A bullet from Orellana, stopped, his gloves absorbing the impact. 

Aspas shot at point-blank range; deflected. 

A missile from Hernández. Blocked and turned away. 

All this action inside the first half. 

Three sharp bursts of the whistle, signifying the end of the match. Marcelo turned to him, eyes round with awed surprise. 

“Paras!” Marcelo exclaimed, running over to him and cannonballing into Keylor's arms, Keylor taking two steps back to absorb his momentum. Their cheeks smushed against each other, heat thrumming off Marcelo’s body as if it were a furnace. “You were superman today.”

Sergio Ramos pranced over, rubbing at the nape of his neck. For a fraction of a second, Ramos had the shy countenance which reminded Keylor of Mateo, his little boy. Only for a fraction of a second, because Ramos had the heart and temper of a beast, his head tossing to and fro like a show horse. 

“Keylor Paras,” Sergio smiled now, all teeth, clapping his hand on Keylor’s shoulder. “You saved our balls out there. Magnifico.”

Before Keylor could react, Sergio pressed his lips against his cheek, a dramatic gesture that appealed to the supporters as they called Navas’ name. 

He still felt cold.

***

“Ah no, amigo,” Marcelo began, as he tumbled in the seat beside Keylor as they boarded the plane. “ _Something. Is. Up!_ ” he finished in English, and Keylor laughed. Due to the English speaking chicos on the team, Marcelo would use the odd English phrase to make a point. Although Keylor had the sensation that Marcelo’s use of English was not quite right. In the fluid and musical lilt of Marcelo’s native Portuguese, to his easy Spanish, his English usage stuck out, like an elbow in the mouth.

It did not stop Marcelo. 

Gareth and Toni were polite enough to correct Marcelo’s English when asked, but never pointed out mistakes otherwise. Cristiano knew English, well enough to speak the language when he collected his award from UEFA every year, and when non-English speakers like Marcelo and himself tried to speak it, he would be warmly encouraging. _It’s good, eh?_ Cristiano would say in English with a golfer's clap, _say more, your accent is beautiful._

Cristiano wasn’t around to hear them maiming the language. After a brief look around the plane, not surprised that everyone had headphones and their laptops open. Or if no one had headphones, they spoke to each other in low voices, their hands over their mouths as if their conversations were for broadcast TV. 

“ _Nothing is ... up_ ,” Keylor said in English, wincing at his accent. 

Marcelo sucked the spit from his teeth, and Keylor knew Marcelo did not mean it as a sign of disgust, but impatience.

“You know what I mean. You haven’t been the same ever since -”

Marcelo did not need to say anything more, but he did anyway. “The failed transfer.”

“No?” 

Keylor let his body go heavy, the aeroplane seat taking all his weight. The flight to Madrid another fifty minutes away; the lights in the plane dimmed enough so that the cluster of lights through the window of the cities below and in the distance spilt across the dark mass of land in glittery clumps, like diamonds on rucked black velvet. Marcelo interrupted his view with a grin and a wave, his hair pulled back from his forehead with a headband, his face open as the palm of his hand. 

“Am I different, Marcelo?” Keylor asked, because he felt different. 

“You tell me.”

“It is... complicated,” Keylor linked his fingers together across his lap. 

“Real Madrid is a big club, everything is complicated,” Marcelo agreed, before raising a fist to his mouth as he tried to hide a yawn, he too leaning back in his seat, Marcelo’s head now a comfortable press against his shoulder. 

“Sí,” Keylor said, as soon as Marcelo’s breathing slowed down, became even. Marcelo’s comment simple, but as Keylor had found to his cost, true. 

Alone in the plane, with Marcelo and everyone else quiet as if they were in a church, the details of the past few days unfolded in front of Keylor’s eyes, in crisp resolution like a movie on his computer, the images not only in clear detail but at their most painful. 

**August 31 - 2015, Barajas Airport 19:00 CET, Madrid**

Barajas airport bustled and heaved with crowds. The tannoy crackled to life frequently, directing people to their gates and advising them of their flight plans in Spanish, English and German. The recessed lights in the ceilings overhead in their departure lounge too bright, harsh lines from the glare casting his form into a brute illustration for judgement. 

Keylor shifted uneasily in his chair, refusing to look up from the screen of his smartphone held in the palms of his hands. He stared at it, willing a text to come through, for an action to stay his execution. Flicked through social media for news in real time instead. In both Spanish and English, although he didn’t know the latter language, his phone translator helped. But the English rumours were just as baseless as the Spanish language ones. 

**Managing Madrid :**  
_Why are we letting Keylor Navas go again? Oh yeah, because it’s Perez, that’s why_

**Marca twitter /English**  
_Real Madrid and Manchester United are still in negotiations for David De Gea’s signature. The hope is that the documents will be done by the time of the deadline, which will be 11:00 BST. Watch this space, story developing..._

 

Real Madrid was a great club, Keylor understood this.

Great clubs kept being great through a system of renewal, of sloughing off the dead skin of its past: players, tactics, managers. It kept its form of winning, its identity of Los Blancos. 

A key element of its reinvention was the sourcing of new players. 

Keylor had a front seat to how Real Madrid shed its players when they were not needed anymore. He had been around club football for enough time to know how favour could be as unpredictable and shapeless as water, and how fate could be crueller than the tales he had heard about and cried at in wonder at as a child. 

Like everything else in the magic of this world, football was ruled by gods who were capable of great deeds. Just like the gods of old realms, they could be just as cruel, and heartless. 

A story worth telling, threaded with great complication and suffering: Iker Casillas, the prince of the Bernabeu, the patron saint of Real Madrid's goal, and the stalwart of the club- forced to abdicate in the cruellest way. 

In the circle of the Bernabeu, just Casillas and a microphone. The support staff threadbare, and a far cry from when a new player was presented. 

Then, you had the compere, the sponsors from important brands, lining up alongside with their goods in hand like jewellers at a parade. Witnesses to the new subject granted the favour of serving Real Madrid. People turned out to greet the new signing in their finery, eagerly flooding into their seats with the same eagerness for a match in the ever continuing rivalries between either Atletico or Barcelona. 

The supporters’ heads attuned to the player’s every movement like the faces of flowers following the arc of the sun. At every sketch of motion, they ahhh'ed. Their cheers and applause punctuating every point of mobility. The screams threading through each word of the interview, ending with the cry of _Hala Madrid_. 

After the speeches, you turned your attention to the ball. 

The ball, such a small thing, but the biggest thing. For this is what the empire of Real Madrid was built on. 

The player with the ball, his skill enough to make old men envy and boys dream. 

Bouncing the ball from instep to instep, to knee, to let it sit coyly on the shoulder and resting against your cheek as brief as a kiss. Your face breaking into a smile, and heart flying from your chest into the open air, because _of course_

A flashback to the chicanery and flair you knew as a boy, before incorporating them into the tricks of the trade you developed as a man. Before Real Madrid sent for you, and you answered yes- like the gods they were, Real Madrid never understood the idea of no- showed up on the pitch of the Bernabeu _a boy again_ \- because to be chosen by Real Madrid -the realisation of the Quetzal blessing childhood dreams. 

A stark contrast to Real Madrid turning its face and favour from you, the warmth and sunshine stealing away from your world; an eclipse that brought darkness, if not terror. 

Casillas saying goodbye in the circle of their much-celebrated pitch, people turning up to see him go, the mood sombre as a funeral. Even in the face of the club’s bad behaviour, Casillas understood _señorio_. His manners flawless, his speech at turns sweeping and heartfelt. 

_Thank you... for allowing me to lift each cup, celebrate each triumph, to be ... the last five years. For being with me during the good times and the bad. For holding out your hand so I could lift myself up._

After the speech, Casillas carried through the manner of _señorio_ to its end. A sweeping bow, his features momentarily hidden from the public before he raised his head again, his eyes red and sheened with emotion. 

Within a blink he was away. Keylor set in Casillas’ place in goal, like a new jewel in the firmament. Sharpened and buffed by his experiences from Levante and the World Cup of 2014, ready to give of his best, to be better. To lace the spirit of _señorio_ into his shoes, his gloves, his way of carrying himself around his teammates and to their supporters. 

Because stories around him were the harbingers of prophecy, Keylor took note of Casillas’ actions in the eye of the hurricane. Promised himself that when Real Madrid’s affections towards him transformed into chill winds, he’d be prepared.

As the screen of the phone swam in front of his eyes, Keylor realised, he had never been ready. 

The wide windows showing the planes from various parts of the world parked on the tarmac outside, flying him to the unknown. 

Wondering when David De Gea would be flying in, Real Madrid ready to fit him into the club’s crown like the new jewel, Navas on the other side, in England, trying to see how he too, would fit. 

The shadows shortened, lengthened, waned. The sun retreated into darkness, the planes’ giant forms now outlined by the row of lights along its various runways. 

“Amino, Papa,” Daniela chided, laying her dimpled hand against his arm, causing him to raise his face to her eyes, now dark and solemn, the ends of her inky black plaits threaded into bright ribbons. “Inglaterra will be a new adventure, yes?”

Keylor nodded. For a frightening moment, unable to speak, until he cleared his throat with a gruff “Sí.”

Daniella leaned into his side. Never one for sitting down, if she could stand or dance. 

Now standing flamingo style on one leg, her body vibrating with tremors of curiosity and mischief. Like her mother, she knew when she needed to be kind, and he drew strength from her presence, his eyes resting on Andrea, as serene and beautiful as a Madonna, cuddling Mateo, curled up like a bean dozing against his mother’s breast. 

It was not the same thing as being in the middle of the ring of the Bernabeu telling the supporters goodbye, but he too could practice the spirit of _señorio_ , Keylor realised. Of saying and doing things well, no matter how complicated the circumstance. “Si,” he said again, voice stronger this time. “A new adventure, another great one.”

***

At quarter to midnight, the lights dimmed into something warmer, but no less grim.

The shutters for the storefronts drifted slowly, closing their wares to all comers. 

The crowds waiting for the flights thinned, noise fading away as the quiet crowded in. Planes still taxing on the runway, or in various stages of flights, and four hours later, Keylor hadn’t moved, trying not to think about Real Madrid, a place he’d made his home for — time did not matter. A home was home, be it six months or six years. Real Madrid was home, _Hala Madrid_ an oath, an anthem. 

Keylor had been here before, where uneasiness swarmed around his form like a hive of angry bees, tormenting him about his future, leaving him unable to doze. Even Daniella now felled by sleep, her form draped across his lap like one of her dolls, mouth slack and her warm drool soaking into the fabric covering his knee. Andrea’s head against his shoulder, her hair tickling his cheek whenever he moved. 

The quiet walked hand in hand with her twin terrors of doubt and despair. Twisted his recollections like those mirrors you looked into at a circus, and although Keylor knew deep within, he had done enough to be the best - he-

Tried to hold the thought away, because it affected the most important aspect of a footballer - confidence. 

His phone buzzed to life in his hand. Careful not to wake Daniella, Keylor answered his phone, voice gruff with fear and hope. “Digame?”

His agent’s voice quivered as he said his name, and Keylor squeezed his eyes shut, ready for another blow. Unable to stop the relieved sob that tore through him when he heard the words, “Te quedas.”

***

“You are different, Paras,” Marcelo said the next day, as they helped themselves to the buffet of options at Cuidad Real Madrid. Their flight from Celta to Barajas airport took a little over an hour. By the time they got through customs, it seemed easier to get on the coach and be driven to Cuidad Real Madrid, to overnight. Each player had an assigned room, and the benefits of a hotel.

Me quedo, Keylor thought as he shifted his carrier bag on his shoulder, the airport still a spectre that haunted him, like Le Cegua in the forests of his native country. The airport a gateway to Manchester, in a country he did not know, nor a language he did not speak. Three matches in, and the novelty of Real Madrid - of _staying_ at Real Madrid still had not settled. _I stay, I stay_. 

The cafeteria kitted out like a hotel, with oversized windows letting the light and sky in, waitstaff drifting by their tables to check if everything was up to the players’ standard. 

Little touches which made Real Madrid the best club in the world, and he was almost thrown out because-- and it was hard to swallow his anger, to be pleasant. 

“Everyone’s different everyday, no?”

***

In the evenings after the sky blushed red before ducking under the cover of deep blue dusk, that was the time Marcelo loved to barbeque. He’d invite the neighbours over- _including you, Paras_ \- he said to Keylor, and Keylor laughed, because he lived in La Finca, a few minutes away by car, gracias.

Marcelo’s house in La Moraleja, a beautiful part of Madrid, where people lived behind high fences and sprawling grounds. Marcelo’s house no different, with the sweep of manicured grass, the house grand and beautiful, glass and pale marble, their surroundings doused in the now softening light of the sunset. 

“Hello, neighbour,” Marcelo greeted at the open door, clad in a Real Madrid top now two seasons old and a pair of Adidas tracksuit bottoms and matching slides. 

“Marcelo,” Keylor greeted with a hug and handed over a tote bag of Guaro, with bottles of Salsa Lizano at the same time. 

“Paras,” Marcelo shook his head, and laughed as he took the tote bag, the bottles softly clinking against each other. “You don’t have to, eh? There’s enough, we have enough.”

“True, but you never should turn up at someone’s house empty-handed, that’s not right.”

Shifting his weight onto his toes, Marcelo threw an arm around Keylor’s shoulders. A bit uncomfortable for both, because Keylor was head and shoulders above Marcelo, but he didn’t mind softening his knees and lowering his head, their foreheads briefly pressed against each other. 

“You’re enough, Paras,” Marcelo said, squeezing his shoulder, “more than enough.”

***

The world might have known Marcelo as one of the best attacking left backs for one of the best teams in the world. His afro swinging and bobbing around his face as he ran the channels, intercepting loose balls from the opposition, ferrying them away from Keylor to the midfield and beyond.

Marcelo though, had one more talent. The art of _Churrasco_. 

Clad in short sleeved t-shirt and shorts, standing in front of the grill, he attended to meat on skewers, roasting over fragrant wood, the air filled with the scent of smoked meats. Ramos and Cristiano acting like serving boys, making sure Marcelo always had a drink in hand or going around from table to table with meats on platters to drop off by their teammates, who wanted more, more. 

Usually for such a thing like this, everyone would bring their families over. The surface of Marcelo’s pool broken into a froth by children splashing and swimming in the water, the air bright with conversation from their spouses, as they spoke to and about each other. 

Not tonight though, not with the air of the team still unsettled. 

Ramos and Marcelo, the team captains, organised a night out at Marcelo’s, inviting members of the first team to come over and break bread for the team building. Much more intimate than going out to a restaurant, with people able to speak freely amongst each other. Lukka and Bale at a table in the corner, speaking English amongst themselves, waving at Toni to yes, sit down, _of course,_ , with us.

Keylor helped himself to the side dishes, although when it came to Marcelo, the side dishes for his Churrasco tended to be meat and more meat. Skewers of beautiful cuts of beef lain across fluffy, steaming white rice, its fat dripping from the beef to the rice below; thick, rich drops of gravy from source.

***

“I know that you are still angry, Paras,” Marcelo said much later when everyone else had eaten and cleared off, taking food with them.

Meat and Feijoada, side dishes of fried rice balls with cheese, and little bottles of the special marinade he made when he had a minute. Keylor stayed behind to help clean, although Marcelo waved him off. "Don't worry," he soothed. 

Marcelo now sat by one of the small tables near the pool, having his belated dinner of roast meat on skewers with fluffy rice and feijoada. When you were a chef running the grill, you tended to be the last to eat. Keylor joined him, but instead of having more of the meat, he sipped at his coconut water, because it didn’t do to drink too much of anything else, especially with training tomorrow. 

“I did not deserve it.”

“No,” Marcelo agreed between bites of meat on the skewer. “You did not. Your place is with us.”

“I thought,” Keylor’s hand curled into a fist, against the table's surface, his pride still stinging when he thought about the day and night he spent at the airport. “I thought I was enough, no?”

“You are,” Marcelo agreed. “King of the stops,” at this Marcelo smiled, bordering on beatific. “You are our wall, Paras,” and a few seconds later grew sober. “But you need to stop being angry, yes? You know football. You know Real Madrid.”

“It is a complicated club.”

“Like all big clubs are,” Marcelo agreed. “But with Real Madrid -- it is like serving a Queen in a fairytale, no? You are there to do her favour until she has no more need of you.”

“I will not sit in the corner, crying. Waiting for people to give me things.”

“No, I am not asking you to do that,” Marcelo wagged a skewer in his direction, most of the meat on it now eaten. “But you must move on. In football, if you’re unhappy, you’re never lucky, Paras.”

“I’m not unhappy,” Keylor answered too quickly for it to be true. 

“But you’re not happy,” Marcelo pushed back, and Keylor had no answer.

***

Before Real Madrid, before he knew the top-class facilities of La Cuidad, there had been Levante.

Every morning Keylor would lace up his boots, warm up and train in the empty stadium. Working on his kicks, clearing the ball from his goal as far up the field as possible. Diagonal kicks that rocketed into the air and came down a distance away so that it bounced at the foot of a forward or midfielder in the heat of the moment.

Dancing through cones, throwing himself between mannequins, seeking and stopping oncoming balls with outstretched gloves. A weight in his hands, his shoulders singing in pain, his fingers numb from the grip as he darted between the sticks, routine absorbed so that it went past thought, distilled into pure reflex. 

His form and work brought him here to Real Madrid. A club that fulfilled the promise of his hard work, to be so good that Real Madrid had no other choice but to summon him into their team, to become a jewel in their crown. 

Still proving his worth with his ball work, his feet, his legs, his saves, his kicks. 

Surrounded by adoring Real Madrid players after matches, “¡Paras! ¡Paras!” they shouted his name like a chant, their arms garlanding his neck and chest like wreaths, Marcelo’s hand against his cheek, Sergio’s lips against his temple. 

Navas raised his gloved hands to the Bernabeu, and the Madridistas showed him their best face, with claps and cheers.

***

“I’m not unhappy,” Keylor said to Marcelo a week later, after training. Bundled up now, because October in Madrid brought brisk winds from the north, and it was enough for them to retreat into long sleeves and tights under their running shorts. At Marcelo’s raised eyebrow, Keylor shook his head, repeating himself. “I’m not, I am---”

Marcelo’s hands tucked into the pockets of his shell suit jacket, his hair hidden from view under an Adidas skullcap.

“I do not know what I am,” Keylor finished, feeling defeated, looking past his friend to the rest of the grounds before him, but seeing nothing.

“What do you need?” Marcelo asked simply, finally. 

Keylor shook his head, throwing his arm around Marcelo’s shoulders, drawing comfort from the solid heat of Marcelo’s body beside him. “I do not know.”

***

Of course, Real Madrid was not just a club devoted to football, but charitable works too. A few weeks before the winter break, the different sports clubs under the Real Madrid umbrella came together for a key charity dinner.

“It is not enough to play well, ” Florentino Pérez began, as he stood up at the head of the table, his form clad in a dark suit a sharp contrast against a crisp white shirt and white tie. The platinum burnished frames of his prescription glasses glinting in the light. Everyone turned in black tie for the Real Madrid foundation dinner. A plate at the table selling for up to thousands of euro all receipts for charity, everyone now seated, their eyes on Señor Pérez as he spoke. “It is even more important to live well, to carry yourself well. To be the embodiment of Real Madrid is to have the spirit of _señorio_ , to be unbowed, to be a gentleman.”

A murmur of agreement rippling in the Grand Presidential Ballroom of Hotel Villa Magna. Keylor did not have an eye for the interior like his wife did, but he appreciated the beauty of their surroundings. The walls with the pastel coloured glossy surface like the boxes she brought home from a day's shopping along the Salamanca District. Chandeliers snug against the ceiling like diamond earrings in earlobes. The tables draped in white linen, falling softly to the floor like dresses for a coronation; crockery and cutlery shone and displayed in such an artful way, as if they were an extension of the displays of jewellery in the halls of the hotel itself. So clean and beautiful, you felt guilty touching anything, although the utensils were there to be used for just banal activities such as eating or drinking. 

“Now, we are not saying that being a winner and being a caballero are two separate things,” Perez continued, graciously allowing the room to respond with laughter and whispers, because Real Madrid’s reason for being was winning, as everyone there knew. “But-” Perez lifted his hands from the podium, and made pressing motions against the air with his hands, the sign that the moment of levity had now passed, and he wished to finish his speech. “No, to be a Real Madrid player is to have that in your DNA, to strive and thrive even when no one is looking. To support your teammates, your friends, for Hala Madrid is more than a cry, it is a state of being. It is not wearing the shirt or kissing the badge, it is -”

Keylor nodded at the truth of it, each word washing over him, as he looked at the members of his table. Each table seated eight and at his table his teammates; Ramos, who winked and shot finger guns at him across the table. Cristiano, Pepe, Jese, Nacho and Marcelo, to his near right. As soon as Keylor’s eyes fell on his friend, Marcelo raised a bottle of beer - with a slice of lime in the neck of the bottle. 

It took him some time to get here, but he realised that right now, he had no hard feelings towards the club. They had given him a chance to prove himself, to be at one of the best clubs in the world. If he were to be turned out in the way of Casillas, like he said to Marcelo in what seemed like a long time ago, he had no fear of dusting himself off and working even harder for the future.

His form attracted another top club in another country, Manchester United in England.

No, although it was not Real Madrid it still was a big club, because of clubs of Manchester United's quality, like Barcelona, like Juventus and other grand clubs - had the power of history and magic and riches to rebirth themselves, to be great once more. To slough off the bad times like a snake shedding skin. 

“---and Keylor “Paras” Navas is the embodiment of _señorio_. For holding his head high during that difficult time, for saving and supporting his teammates and as an extension, the fortunes of this club, please raise your glasses.”

Qué? 

Keylor jerked his head so hard, the muscles in his neck clicked. He pressed his hand against his mouth to cover his shock. 

“Paras!” Sergio’s face wreathed in smiles, as he held his wine glass aloft. 

“You think we don’t know?” Marcelo shook his head at his friend in disbelief, his eyes dark and serious. “That we don’t see, Paras? You are our wall, our protector. You have our backs and do things that no other goalie can do.”

“There is no other,” Cristiano gave a solemn nod of his head, before he too grinned, the luminosity of his smile competing with the wattage of the diamonds glittering at his ears in the delicate lights of the room, and because Cristiano knew the running in-joke he and Marcelo shared, he said in English, “Congratulations.”

“I--” Keylor could not help it. He was not one given to unnecessary smiles, the football too serious, his tending to his own form too deliberate to invite mirth. However, seeing the faces of his teammates beaming at him, the lights bouncing off the edge of glasses, the _warmth_ of his teammates' feelings radiating towards him, he really could not help it, his cheeks hurting from the grin, but he could not stop. 

“I---”

“Speech! Speech!” Marcelo shouted, as he put down his bottle of beer and started clapping. His actions creating a ripple effect, of everyone clapping and cheering as he stood up, his face hot with embarrassment and shyness. 

“You can stand where you are,” Pérez, never one to relinquish control of the front of the stage. Even in this too, Keylor proved to be a liar, as the rest of the room dimmed, the chandelier above his table the only one alight, sending out a soft golden hue, as if blessed. Keylor got to his feet, his hands against the table to brace his wobbling knees, seeing everyone seated, their faces to him, like fellow actors waiting on the protagonist to speak: all his teammates, the _mister_ and his assistants, the heads from the rest of the heads of sports from Real Madrid. 

“I--” Keylor’s heart grew three times larger in his chest, pressing against his ribcage, and he splayed his fingers against his chest, to hold it in place, before it exploded from the sheer joy of this moment. 

“Paras,” a murmur, the warm, broad palm of Marcelo’s squeezing along his forearm, and the tumbled feelings of panic and joy gave way to calm as he looked into Marcelo’s face, and yes, the words were there all along. 

“I am,” he started now, voice surer this time as he looked out at the crowd. “Lucky,” he continued. “Like Marcelo says, if you are unhappy you are never lucky in football, and since I have been here, I have always been lucky. Even when I was at the airport, waiting to go away ---” an almost wobble, but he moved on quickly. “I never felt unlucky, because it brought me here, and luck has made me stay here. I am happy to be here, and when you are happy in your role and in your life and with teammates such as these --” Keylor paused, the last vestiges of doubt and bitterness gone, because he was still _here_ , and not in Manchester. “It is easy to live well, to play well. For everyone to --” Marcelo’s hand still touching his forearm, the warmth and the weight like an emotional anchor because his voice and mind threatened to float away. 

“It is an honour to be considered like this, and -- thank you, thank you very much.” 

The applause filled the cavernous room, making it reverb, the pop of flashes blinding him for a minute as he dropped into his seat. When everyone stood and serenaded him with the song _Hala Madrid y Nada Más_ , Keylor bowed his head, and covered his eyes, not wanting anyone to see his face. 

When Marcelo pressed a linen napkin into Keylor’s palm, Keylor realised he had not bowed his head low enough.

***

At the end of the party, when everyone drifted off either to the rooms upstairs or into their cars back to the city, Keylor was still seated at the table, unable to see around the huge, round bouquet of white roses in front of him. The romantic lavender tint of the room now gone, the lights brought up, with a lemony tint. The party ending, his jacket shucked off on the back of his chair, his tie undone, his body thrumming with such good energies, as if he had swallowed a small star.

Marcelo in similar stages of undress, but went one better, the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled up to his elbows, pointing at the bottles of beer before him with his index finger, in a game of _Tin marín de dos pingüe_ before choosing the beer on the left. 

Around them both, the staff drifting around the room, attending to their duties of sweeping and cleaning up with the shadowy presence of ghosts.

”You did not have to do this, you know.”

“Do what?” The expression on Marcelo’s face having the untainted sweetness of a child’s, and immediately, Keylor knew. 

“Marcelo--”

“It was all of us,” Marcelo shrugged his shoulders with an easy grace, handing Keylor a bottle of beer. “For long stretches of the season so far, you have carried us, and never complained, or made it seem difficult, no matter what your emotional outlook. Pérez needed to say thank you, and it was no trouble to convince him. It is never too late to say 'thank you', Paras,” Marcelo finished with his characteristic grin. “It’s just that we’re Real Madrid, and we do it well.”

“Señorio,” Keylor smiled, the word coming to his lips unprompted. 

Marcelo raised his bottle of beer, motioning to Keylor to do the same. 

"Saúde," Marcelo said, and Keylor joined in, clinking their beers together before each took a long swallow. To Keylor, nothing tasted sweeter.

“You fit here,” Marcelo tapped his forefinger against the surface of their table after they put their beers down. “Never doubt it, Paras.”

Keylor sank into his chair, reflecting on the past few months, and tonight. Realised Marcelo was right. Again. 

_Me queda_ , the thought came to him, and he smiled, realising that the statement was true.

Fin.

**Author's Note:**

>   * This fic takes place around the transfer window when Real Madrid and Manchester United were going to do a trade, David De Gea coming to RM and Navas going to Manchester United. Unfortunately, due to a rogue [Fax machine, the move didn't go through](http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/transfer-news/manchester-united-hit-back-real-6364143)
>   * This fic is heavily drawn from [this article](https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2015/oct/26/keylor-navas-real-madrid-manchester-united-la-liga)
>   * According to Sid Lowe, they call Keylor Navas 'Paras' because he stops balls from going into the net 
>   * The meaning of señorio - [this article explains it](https://www.managingmadrid.com/2017/4/3/15164848/nacho-fernandez-upholding-madrids-senorio)
> 



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